It gets the highest rating for me as it was my first GD show. I recently went to a JGB show in Old Orchard Beach the year before which was incredible and I was hooked. Drove down in my Subaru hatchback with a school friend. As we walked through the overpass we were greeted by a fellow dead head that had freshly double dipped blotter. My first trip was at that JGB show so I was fairly a newbie to tripping so I was naive to what double dipped meant. I only took one but my friend took a whole 10 strip and the dead head who sold it to us observed and stated "you're fucked" and he looked at me with great concern lol. We then made our way in and sat down and I was already feeling it when they started playing. I absolutely loved Bertha despite any imperfections and I recall thinking to myself how intense this trip was already getting and then I looked over to my friend and he was just talking jibberish and visually tracking his moving hands. I touched his shoulder to get his attention and he immediately stood up with fear in his eyes and proceeded to abruptly leave. I never saw him again until he came to get his duffle bag from me a month later. lol I asked what happened and where did he go and he stated that some nice people took care of him and he decided to hang with them for a few weeks. lol After he abruptly left it really started to kick in. I was definitely peaking at this point. It was like a complete dream state. I remember the light coming on halfway through the show and everyone in the stadium started doing the human wave. That was just incredible!!!!!!!! Everyone in their tye dye shirts really made it look incredible especially tripping the way I was. I remember loving The Wheel and really getting emotional about it lol. When the show eneded and we were exiting, a guy told me to not even look at the security guards as they were being rough with the crowd. I was still tripping so hard and finally got to my Subaru which was vandalized and had "dents" all over it and 4 slashed tires. Well a kind young woman saw I was in distress and came over and told me to place my hand on the tires and I then realized that I was just tripping and seeing "melted tires" lol. I remember thanking her so much and the guards started to come over and told me that I have to leave right now. Oh shit!! Okay, there I was going down Interstate 95 and the highway had big waves and I was going up and down lol. I saw a fellow deadhead hitchhiking so I decided to pull over and pick him up (on 95 lol). He got in and said oh you were at the show and I looked at him and said yeah, it was great. When he saw my eyes, I could see a look of terror come over him and he stated "Okay, I can be let outat this next exit, thanks" lol. So I dropped him off and realized that I shouldn't be driving so I stopped at the next rest area and slept it off. I absolutely don't condone what I did. I was 19 and stupid but I will never ever forget that experience. It's permanently embedded in my core memories.

probably NOT the line to be singing once inside the Byrne 'Sports' complex
Check out Brent getting in our faces lyrically.during BERTHA
I swear that guy just carried the band during this period.
This was a period right thru to Tinley Park that the band just had a snap and crispness.
In many ways it reminds me of 85 when the band was just feeling its oats.
Other things i enjoyed during this time period:
Weir calmed down on the Dylan nasal talk thing and started singing again.
Phil did plenty of harmonies especially on the Built to Last material.
In fact if you listen they worked some great harmonies into that material for the entire band
including the cover tunes like LET THE GOOD TIMES ROLL..
In Jerry's voice there was much more optimism. He was one of the rare singers who could project raw emotions thru his vocals.

may be the best version of when I paint my masterpiece that ive ever heard...

i went to an overflowing handful of shows on this tour. this show, in an indoor arena, left me thinking: what's wrong? it may have been this show at the meadowlands stop, i don't remember, that kreutzmann ran off early at halftime. something just wasn't happening.

then it did. black peter. the whole show was waiting to see here how everything lead up to this day.

this is the greatest two hour black peter i can imagine.

is it just me or do i hear a faint int of Fire on the Mountain in the china jam?

Check out the extended version of 'China cat' interesting work there. New territory is found here.The first half of the 2nd set is way out there and they loose some fizz throughout post drums.

The sound quality on this one is fair, good presence and pretty clean, I'll give it a 3.5 stars (leaning a little toward 4). The gig itself is actually pretty poor. I'm glad someone else was able to get into it and was able to like it but I wasn't. The timing among everyone was pretty poor, several songs were taken at different tempos than usual which didn't improve them. Lots of blown notes and chords and lyrics, just a very sloppy gig with flashes of brilliance. It seemed they were never able to gain any momentum. Quite understandable considering that the Warlocks gigs were only 72 hours prior. Given the huge quantity of stellar gigs that were to be played in its aftermath, I'd give this one a miss. I'm more or less a completist and I didn't burn this one to disc

The 2nd set of this show is so sublime. I don't want to try to "review" this music. I'd feel like some kind of turd doing that. I'd just like to say that the 2nd set is tapped into a greater source of...energy...inspiration...whatever you want to call it. This music is the product of a band of modern day musical shamman. Sorry if this sounds ridiculous. Mellow out and surrender to what the Dead made easily available to us on this night.

Jerry seems a little off on this night, compared to the other shows in this run, blowing lots of lyrics. He misses the "Inspiration" in Terrapin by about six miles. On the plus side, the Just a Little Light goes at a slower tempo than usual, giving it a different feel.